


Because it's 2016

by BristlingBassoon



Category: Political RPF, Political RPF - 20th-21st c., Political RPF - Canadian 21st c., Political RPF - US 21st c.
Genre: American Politics, Bisexual Male Character, Bisexuality, Canadian Politics, Fluff, Light Angst, M/M, Montreal, Westminster system, trubama
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-06
Updated: 2016-07-06
Packaged: 2018-07-21 22:27:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7407568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BristlingBassoon/pseuds/BristlingBassoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Obama and Trudeau meet again and shake hands.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Because it's 2016

Barack can’t stop thinking about his hands. The temperature of them seems all wrong somehow, and they’re dry and slippery. How can they be dry _and_ slippery?

 

Justin doesn’t seem to notice. He motions Barack over, beside him, and then beckons for the 

Mexican president to join them. Barack looks at Enrique, paranoid that he somehow knows.

 

He doesn’t have long to think about it before they’re drawn together in an elaborate handshake chain. It’s Justin co-ordinating it of course, always Justin. His arms move seamlessly from one president to the other, shaking both at the same time. His hands are on their backs and he laughs, completely unselfconsciously.

It was as if they’d never kissed, thinks Barack. It was as if none of this had ever happened.

 

Justin jokes about their “bromance” during his introductory speech, and Barack is as startled as a disturbed bird. If he could, he’d clatter out of there hastily, but he lacks the wings somehow. He thinks of pigeons and envies them.

Does everybody know? He manages to respond warmly, but he’s looking at each reporter in turn. Does he know? Does _she_ know? Wait - that’s another prime minister’s daughter - Justin had told him that. She must know then, surely she knows how these things work. Did this kind of thing happen to her? 

 

They manage to snatch a moment together later - in an conference room at the house of Commons, near a table of empty water glasses. Someone’s left a teabag on the corner of the table, and the brown stain has blossomed across the cloth.

“You seem a little tense,” Justin says. He was close to Barack out there in front of the cameras but now he’s even closer - kissing distance, Barack might have thought, if it weren’t for the fact that Justin seems to do this to everyone. He’s a man who wants to hug the world.

“So you're going to Pride then?” Barack asks. 

“Sure, I go every year,” Justin replies with a shrug. He leans back on the table briefly and then quickly decides not to, as the water glasses begin chattering amongst themselves. “Huh, I thought furniture in the house of commons would be less cheap. I’ll have to propose a bill for extra funding.”

“Why?” demands Barack. “I usually just speak about it, maybe go to some kind of address. I’m not in the parade.”

“I like being in the parade!” It’s the first time Barack’s heard that tone of voice from him. Irritated, like a horse with shivering muscles shaking off a fly. “Why, why do you seem so bothered about it? I didn’t think you were a homophobe, or I wouldn’t have kissed you.”

And there it is. Barack lets out a little sigh, not sure how to continue. He’s supposed to be one of the best orators in world politics, and yet he’s stumped.

“Are you worried?” continues Justin quietly.

“Aren’t you worried that everyone knows?”

“Barack…” Justin smiles at the ground for a minute, and then those blue eyes are once again looking at him. “I mean sure, some conservative senator from Saskatchewan will probably imply that I’m gay, as well as being a woman - which I apparently am.” He looks far more amused than bothered. “It’s just politics. Sure I want people to like me, but only for the right reasons.”

“You’re not gay?” Barack says, raising an eyebrow. 

“There are more letters in that acronym,” the reply comes. And then Justin’s right there with him, kissing him. 

Barack likes the fact that he doesn’t have to bend down for once.

 

————————

 

Justin’s at university when he kisses a man for the first time.

It isn’t like it matters much there - boys and girls come from Catholic schools where anything longer and more intimate that a sidelong glance is strongly disapproved of, and so the minute they arrive at McGill they eagerly press themselves up against each other in the corridors, snatch kisses between classes, stopping to canoodle on the footpath of the Avenue Des Pins.

It’s a time for trying things. Or, if you came from a boy’s school, or a girl’s school, you’d tried it all before.

Justin somehow misses out. The ones kissing and slipping hands into each other’s pants are often the ones who act the straightest, who shove everyone else around and call them queer, with a disaffected kind of venom. Maybe it’s the memory of having a car following his bus when he goes to school, or maybe it’s a fear of giving anyone even more reasons to dislike him, but Justin keeps to himself. He ignores the attention of an older insolent blonde boy who gives him sidelong glances. He pretends not to notice when sports practices get a little more hands-on than normal. 

At McGill, it seems different somehow.

There’s a boy - Jean Tremblay. Some of the others in their classes lump them both together, call them the JTs. _Did you see the JTs today? Nah, they weren’t in tutorial._

Jean has a roommate who’s a film major, a thin girl from Villa Maria who’s so blonde she seems almost transparent. She sits on the metal stairs outside the house and smokes while wearing black gloves with the fingers ravelled off, a concession against the cold. Her classes can’t be very often, because whenever Justin’s there she’s always around.

It’s because of her that Jean works out that he can sneak into the film studies class when they’re having a screening. It’s a big enough theatre. Sure, sometimes they show stuff that nobody would ever want to watch unless they had to, like a full-length DW Griffith melodrama with tinted negatives and people making faces, or one of those awful Quebec films from the sixties that make you want to revoke your citizenship, but often it’s Kubrick. Or Hitchcock. Or Kurosawa. Or someone new, someone you either really like, or want to at least pretend to.

One morning Justin’s heading off to the library when Jean comes up and grabs him by the sleeve like a child in a supermarket.

“Screening now - let’s go.”

“It’s 10 in the morning!” Justin protests, but he allows himself to be led to the auditorium, and to squeeze through the smallest possible gap in those heavy doors. 

They shuffle into the back rows, behind all those rows of huddled heads, faces blued by the screen. 

And it’s there, midway through _2001_ , that Jean turns and kisses him.

Jean’s mouth meets his, and slips off to the side, first warm and then cool. He tastes of smoke. Justin’s eyes widen in the dark.

He can feel something buzzing between them. Jean’s hand reaches for his, and Justin takes it. He realises he likes this; he likes Jean, with his sweep of hair and his ever-present stubble and his second-hand sweater that he always wears. He doesn’t know why he likes him or what it means, but he decides not to worry, and he leans over and kisses Jean back. He feels Jean’s tongue in his mouth, puts his hands on Jean’s face, and doesn’t try and imagine that Jean is a girl. 

The monolith is whining to a painful crescendo and nobody notices them.

 

A week later they go for mid-term break, and when class resumes Jean’s gone.

“His father called him back home,” Jean’s housemate says when she answers the door, trying not to let in the gusts of wind that swirl around Justin as he stands on the iron landing. 

“What?” Justin protests, but Alex is too busy winding a black scarf around her neck to hear him. “Why? Where does he live?”

“I don’t know,” Alex says, shrugging. “Near Knowlton or something? Why don’t you look him up?”

There’s no number, no forwarding address. Justin wonders how it’s possible for Alex to live with Jean and know him so little - and then realises he could say the same about himself. 

He’s halfway up the street when, horrified, he realises he’s crying.

 

Justin finally gets to the library and borrows the books he was supposed to get before the break. 

He gets the feeling something bad must have happened to Jean, but isn’t sure what or how he knows. He finds himself climbing the mountain as if he’ll find him there, or somehow get a sign when he’s at the top, but it’s nothing except squirrels, someone’s abandoned glove stuck on the limb of a tree, maples changing colour.

He’s glad he still likes girls too. The whole “being gay” thing would have been a real headache. He doesn’t have to go to the village and hope he’ll meet someone there. He has the luxury of chance, of being able to meet someone through a friend or in a class and get to know them, instead of walking up to someone in a bar with purple lights and a Tuesday drink special, and hoping.

But Justin worries about Jean. 

A few years later he watches Philadelphia for the first time. When he leaves the cinema, he wonders if Jean’s still alive. 

His name’s so common that Justin knows he’ll never be able to find him.

 

When he’s at Pride, Justin feels like he’s sharing a secret with everyone there. He isn’t sure Barack would understand.

 

————————

 

Justin is the first man Barack has ever kissed. Well, not like this, with his hands in Justin’s hair, with another hand brushing against Justin’s thigh, not worrying about the consequences.

They break for breath, and Justin chuckles against Barack’s neck, then goes to pour himself some water, only to find that all of the jugs are empty. 

“ _Tabernac_ ,” he mutters deliberately for Barack’s benefit, grinning as he does so.

“You’re just trying to be as Canadian as possible, aren’t you?” Barack shoots back, unable to hide his grin.

“Damn, you've discovered my secret,” Justin replies. “Turns out,” he says, putting on a woefully exaggerated American twang on top of his light raised vowels, “I’m not Canadian at all.”

The joke floats weakly across the room and then dies before it reaches Barack, who stares at Justin as if he’s just revealed something shocking.

“Hey,’ Justin says, suddenly concerned. His eyes - god, his eyes, they’re the softest most beseeching eyes you’d ever see outside of a puppy in one of those ASPCA ads. Damn him! 

“Is everything Ok? Do you want to talk about this or would you like me to go?”

“What do you think?” mutters Barack, but doesn’t move. Justin gazes expectantly at him. 

“God, sometimes I really hate you,’ Barack finally says. “I mean - what would happen if people found out about this? It’d be ok for _you -_ oh, you’d probably get sunny interviews in the lifestyle section, everyone would think it was just hilarious that you were flirting with the president. But I’d be the worst president in the world. I’d be a lying god-hating philanderer who _literally_ got into bed with those liberal commies we make maple syrup jokes about, _oh_ and I’d also probably be destroying American values even more than I apparently already have. My kids would hate me, my wife - god, my wife!” 

He gives Justin an angry look. 

“And the worst thing is,” Barack continues, “is that I can’t blame you at all. _I_ wanted this. I don’t know why, but I did, and now I…I don’t know what to do.”

“Oh,” replies Justin. He seems almost crushed. “I wish I could say something.”

“It’s not a filibuster,” mutters Barack bitterly. “You don’t have to.”

They stand in silence for a few moments. Barack’s watch ticks loudly. Somewhere in the building there’s a sound - Justin thinks it’s the division bell, and hastily starts straightening his tie, only to realise that it’s just someone’s ringtone or maybe a distant alarm.

“I hate this stupid Westminster system,” says Barack randomly.

“You wouldn’t be the only one,” Justin remarks. “Every election there’s always someone in some swinging seat wanting to vote directly for a PM and being outraged when they’re told they have to vote for someone in their riding instead. But - “ he shrugs. “It’s what we’ve got to work with.”

“Who knows?” Barack asks.

“What, who knows how Canadian parliament works?”

“No,” Barack says impatiently. “Who knows about your whole,” he waves his arm vaguely at some invisible force, “your whole…. _thing._ ”

“Oh, that!” Now Justin’s smiling again. “Well, my mother knows, a couple of my siblings, my wife -“

“Your _wife?_ ” Barack demands. “Is there anyone who doesn’t know?”

“I didn’t tell my father,” Justin says quietly. “I don’t know - he was kind of an old fashioned guy. Well not that old fashioned - he did legalise it - but I don’t think he wanted his son to be, and it…I guess it didn’t seem necessary. It would have been different if I were dating a man, but I never really did.”

“You never _really_ did?” Barack says. “What does that mean?”

“Maybe another time,” replies Justin firmly. 

“So why doesn’t the rest of Canada know?’ Barack replies. “It’d be one thing keeping it under wraps if you were a conservative, but you’re the kind of guy who goes to Pride.”

“When you’re married to a woman it doesn’t really seem relevant I suppose,” Justin says. “Even though…I guess it is. It’s always relevant, because…well, it’s you, isn’t it?”

“You don’t have to do anything,” Barack reminds him. “Although I can’t help feeling worried, all of the time. For both of us.” He looks nervously towards the door, but for whatever reason this section of parliament may as well have tumbleweeds blowing through it. “What would your wife say if she knew about us?”

Justin raises his eyebrow and smiles to himself. “She’d probably ask me for details.”

“Details? Seriously?”

“She’s indescribable. I can’t imagine life without her.” 

There are a million thoughts running through Barack’s head, but he doesn’t know which of them to focus on. Justin and his wife and the way they look at each other, as if there’s no room for anyone else in the world. No - banish that one. He doesn’t want to feel worse for being here, worse for wanting to undo Justin’s shirt. He wonders if he’d fumble with the buttons, whether they’d be harder to unfasten in reverse. 

Barack thinks of the little garden they’d made at Pennsylvania Avenue, and wonders whether it’ll be maintained or ripped up when he’s replaced with a blonder president - although which one, he cannot say. He thinks of the handshake earlier, and for one irrational thought wonders whether Justin tries this with every world leader - whether he’s whispering in Malcolm Turnbull’s ear or leading Angela Merkel into a storage room or whether Canada’s partnership with Mexico involves as much flirting as this special relationship seems to. He briefly considers voicing this but he knows in his heart it’s absurd. 

He wonders if he’d feel better or worse if Justin were a woman, whether it would feel less frightening or whether he’d want this less.

The division bell actually does sound this time. It’s a thing of beauty really, the ringing, the lights, the scurry of MPs finally emerging.

“Well, I guess that’s me,” Justin says. He smiles sadly. 

“You’re always going. I don’t want you to go,” Barack finds himself saying. After years of being the one who’s always leaving, running off to some other engagement, now he’s the one. If he were a child he’d be tugging at the leg of Justin’s suit, begging for reassurance that he’d come back. Somehow the understanding of object permanence doesn’t make the parting any better.

Justin moves as if to kiss him again, in a manner that’s oddly formal.

“I’d better not,” Barack says sadly.

“I understand,” Justin says. He goes to shake Barack’s hand instead, his hand outstretched like he’s giving in a resignation letter. Or he’s a telegram boy, handing Barack bad news he already knows. Barack grasps Justin’s hand, horribly conscious of the rings that Justin’s wearing. They’re warm from his fingers, but they feel like little warnings. 

The handshake is less of a shake than a hold. Neither of them seem to want to let go.

“Go be prime minister,” Barack says finally, easing his hand free. “You’re good at that. 

Christ - every other country’s government seems to be going to shit, but Canada has _you._ You’re the envy of the world - god knows I’m jealous.”  

Justin laughs. “Well, I’ll do my best. But - that - that really means I have to go now, before they send someone to look for me.” He begins to walk to the door, hesitating with every step like a man who’s positive he’s forgotten something.

 

“Barack?”

 

“Yes?”

 

“You don’t really hate me though, do you?”

 

“No,” Barack says, with a heavy feeling. “Anything but.”

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I know it's not as neat and concise as my other Trudeau/Obama fic but hopefully it was still worth reading.


End file.
